


please forgive me for the things i've left unsaid

by zeitgeistofnow



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Betrothal Necklace (Avatar), But also, F/F, Getting Back Together, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Promises, Time Skips, grandmas in LOVE!!!, mentions of p-kku
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-27
Updated: 2020-09-27
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:14:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26672740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zeitgeistofnow/pseuds/zeitgeistofnow
Summary: kanna throws a final fur at her and shuts the drawer. yugoda quickly folds the fur and places it in the bag carefully. “is that it?” she asks, careful to mask just how anxious that question makes her. when kanna is finished packing, she’ll be ready to leave.when kanna leaves, yugoda will be alone with only kanna’s polar bear dog at her side. yugoda’s now, she supposes. inaq, the dog, couldn’t come on the sea voyage with kanna, so he will be left here. just like yugoda.
Relationships: Kanna/Yugoda (Avatar)
Comments: 23
Kudos: 47
Collections: AtLA WLW week 2020





	please forgive me for the things i've left unsaid

Kanna’s eyes are focused, even as her hands frantically scrabble between the coats and tunics in her dresser. She’s made a pile on the bed, one that Yugoda has folded and smoothed and made into a neater pile in the other girl’s quickly filling knapsack. A few furs sit on the bottom, layered with coats and Kanna’s work dresses. 

Her nicest dresses stay in the dresser, and Yugoda isn’t sure if that means that she’s coming back, or if where she’s going won’t need the same finery as the Northern Water Tribe. 

Her hair ties and a few spare beads sit in a delicate leather bag Yugoad had made for her, and Pakku’s betrothal necklace is tucked in the pocket of one of the coats. Yugoda doesn’t quite understand why Kanna is keeping the necklace, if she’s going through all this trouble to forge a life without Pakku, but when she’d asked Kanna has only said “it’s a gorgeous piece of jewelry,” and left it at that.

Yugoda would never be one dispute that Pakku has  _ skill,  _ because he has more mastery of the men’s side of waterbending than anyone else- on track to become the next master, with his commanding voice and fluid movements- and the way he’s used the water to carve gentle divots in the stone looks smooth and solid, like it could last for generations. Still, the design is impersonal and gives away just how little Pakku knows Kanna. The waves are something of a default design for betrothal necklaces, regarded as thoughtful only if the man’s fiance is a sailing man or a powerful bender. 

If Yugoda was designing the necklace- which she wouldn’t be, even if she was Kanna’s betrothed, which she  _ isn’t,  _ as much as she wishes sometimes- she would choose birds, she thinks. Something soaring and free. 

Not the  _ fucking  _ ocean.

She’s only disturbed from her daydreams when Kanna throws a final fur at her and shuts the drawer. Yugoda quickly folds the fur and places it in the bag carefully. “Is that it?” she asks, careful to mask just how anxious that question makes her. When Kanna is finished packing, she’ll be ready to leave.

When Kanna leaves, Yugoda will be alone with only Kanna’s polar bear dog at her side. Yugoda’s now, she supposes. Inaq, the dog, couldn’t come on the sea voyage with Kanna, so he will be left here. Just like Yugoda.

Kanna takes a breath and pats both her pockets- one with the money for the voyage and a few more for once she gets settled, one with the name of the place she means to end up, meant only for the eyes of the crew. Even Yugoda hasn’t seen it. 

“No,” Kanna admits, and Yugoda knows she doesn’t mean she’s missing luggage. Kanna sits down heavily next to Yugoda and brings her knees up to her chest like she’s a child again. 

Yugoda leans into her, wrapping an arm around Kanna’s broad shoulders, the muscle of her arms. She feels like she might disappear from between Yugoda’s hands, even as her physical body is solid and strong. 

Yugoda has always been the one to take root- sturdy, her mother would say, the reliable one where Kanna is all bravery and wide, smooth wings taking to the sky. Yugoda would say that she’s just too scared to leave the people who depend on her, too scared to jump in order to see if she would soar. Kanna would say, with a quiet wry smile, that Yugoda is like one of the smooth pebbles they find at the beach- dependable, but it needs a wave to carry it away.

They’d both always figured that Kanna would be that wave, but here Yugoda is. Staying just because Kanna is leaving a little earlier than she was ready for.

“It’s okay if you’re not ready,” Yugoda says, and she’s not sure if she means to end it with  _ you can go anyway,  _ or  _ you can stay.  _

“I know,” Kanna says, “but I  _ am  _ ready to go, I’m just not sure if I’m ready to leave you, pebble.”

Yugoda doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t know what she would say.

Finally, Kanna sighs and stretches. She’s one of the tallest girls in the tribe, almost taller than Pakku, and she likes to joke that the spirits made her tall so that she could knee boys making fun of Yugoda in the crotch. Yugoda thinks it’s hilarious and she knows that’s why Kanna keeps making the joke, sees it in the quietly pleased way the other girl smiles when she laughs. Pakku doesn’t think it’s funny. Kanna doesn’t care.

Kanna never cares what people think of her and it makes Yugoda think that one day she could be the same way. 

Kanna stands, still stretching her arms out in a way that Yugoda knows makes the muscles in her back flex, even if she can’t see through Kanna’s cloak. “I guess it doesn’t matter if I’m ready to leave you,” she says, “if you’re not ready to come with.” There’s a quiet tragedy in her voice and it takes all of Yugoda’s control to gloss over it.

“I guess not,” she says, standing and burying her face in Kanna’s fur hood. “I’ll miss you so much.”

“I’ll miss you too,” Kanna says, and her voice is choked with tears in a way it hasn’t been since her parents passed. Yugoda feels her arms move to pull something out of her pocket- the left one, with her destination in it. “I got a new memory bead,” she says quietly. 

Beads are added for things that people don’t want to forget, and dead family members are carried in the form of beads. Kanna only has three- one for her mother, one for her father, one for her coming of age, and they are tied at the top of her hair loops. Two deaths and the beginning of a life.

Yugoda has one for her father’s buffalo yak and one for her own coming of age, a ceremony she had done with Kanna. They had held each other’s hands through their tattoos and Yugoda swears she had bruises on her fingers for months from how hard Kanna had gripped them. 

“Oh?” Yugoda asks. Fur fills her mouth when she talks and she leans away, letting Kanna turn around in her arms to look down at her.

Kanna holds up her hand, two carved stone beads in her hands. They’re Pakku’s work, careful divots around each. “I told him I wanted nicer ones to replace the ones I use for my parents,” she says, voice wry. 

He’s so  _ full  _ of himself, thinking that his craftsmanship is good enough that Kanna would replace her parent’s beads. Yugoda knows her better than that, Yugoda would have seen through- whatever Kanna is doing.

If Yugoda was Kanna’s betrothed, she wouldn’t even need to leave. She could have stayed next to Yugoda. 

“What are they actually for?”

Kanna presses one into Yugoda’s hand, leaving their fingers entangled in a way that isn’t necessary to just give her a bead. It’s moments like this that Yugoda wonders if Kanna feels the same, if Kanna can see a future with her the same way Yugoda can. “For you,” she whispers, “and one for me. You can’t forget me and I won’t forget you.”

The bead is smooth and warm from being in Kanna’s pockets. Yugoda can imagine wearing them, can imagine walking past Pakku wearing his own handiwork at the top of her hair loops. Letting him know that Kanna  _ loved her,  _ enough to tell Yugoda what she would never tell Pakku.

“Promise?” Kanna prompts, eyes hard and insistent.

“Promise,” Yugoda repeats, closing her hand around the bead. She looks up at Kanna, at the face she’ll maybe never see again, at the love she lost before she ever had, and then they’re kissing.

Yugoda will look back on the moment a thousand times in the next few decades and sometimes she’s sure she kissed Kanna first and sometimes she can’t imagine that that was what happened. All she knows is that Kanna kisses like kissing Yugoda is the most important thing she’s ever done, like she’s trying to say a thousand things in one kiss. 

When they break apart, Kanna looks nervous in the odd determined way she has, eyes vulnerable only to the people who know how to look past the brave veneer. “I’m sorry I didn’t do that before,” she says.

Yugoda tugs her closer, resting their foreheads together. “I’m sorry  _ I  _ didn’t,” she says back. “But it’s okay. Someday we’ll find each other again, somehow, and we can be happy.”

“Promise?” Kanna whispers.

Yugoda doesn’t say anything, just hugs Kanna tighter. They both pretend they don’t notice the silence. 

Yugoda steps off the boat and into the Southern Water Tribe after the war ends. She’d volunteered to teach healing at the southern tribe, a symbolic olive brace, a way to say that the north only wants healing for both tribes. There were more things that went into her personal decision: a wish to not inflict Pakku on Katara and Kanna again, a feeling that she could be of more use to the world teaching people who haven’t been taught in decades, an overwhelming  _ need  _ to be with Kanna, now that Yugoda knows where she is.

Hakoda is waiting for her at the end of the gangplank, head high and eyes kind. He’s a good leader, Yugoda can already tell, someone who treats everyone like family and cares about his family more than anyone in the world. He must have learned that from his mother. 

“Welcome, master,” he says, leaning down to rub noses with her. He’s so tall, too, just like Kanna. “We’re so glad to have you.”

“It’s wonderful to be here,” Kanna says.

“I can’t wait to show you around the tribe. We’re doing our best to rebuild, and nothing is built overnight, but we’re-” Hakoda cuts himself off, smile widening at something behind Yugoda. Yugoda glances behind herself. 

Inaq, Yugoda’s polar bear dog, bounds down the gangplank a moment later, her bags slung over his back. Hakoda flashes her a tentative look, one she recognises from children, especially her youngest students, who aren’t quite sure if petting the dog is allowed. Yugoda gives him an encouraging nod and he drops onto his knees, scrubbing his fingers through the fur of Inaq’s neck and nuzzling his face against the dog’s. 

“You’re a good boy, aren’t you, you’re going to  _ love  _ it here, mmhm, my kids are going to think you’re the best thing since seal jerky-” Inaq barks happily and Hakoda leans back, giving him one last pat on the head. He looks just a little sheepish. “Sorry, my husband doesn’t want pets and I get a little excited when I see a dog.”

“Kanna always loved animals,” Yugoda says, watching Inaq watch Hakoda. The dog obviously already adores the chief, which is a good sign. Yugoda doesn’t trust people Inaq doesn’t trust.

“We had a dog when I was younger,” Hakoda says. “He died in a raid, though.” His face goes horribly blank for a moment and Yugoda steps forward and puts a hand on his arm.

“I’m sorry,” she says, and they both know she’s not just expressing sympathy for the dog. A lot of things have been lost to the Fire Nation.

“It was a long time ago,” he says softly. Hakoda shakes his head minutely and his kind smile returns full force. Yugoda doesn’t think it’s a mask, as easy as that would be to assume from the way he seems to default to it. Some people are just happy, though, no matter if it’s natural or hard-won. Some people smile as their base expression. Yugoda’s always tried to be one of those people, and she can tell that Hakoda tries too. “Anyway,” he says, “hopefully…” He eyes Inaq, like he’ll be able to guess the dog’s name from his happily panting face.

“Inaq,” Yugoda vounlenteers.

“Hopefully Inaq will be enough to convince Bato. The kids have been begging for a dog since I came home.” Hakoda’s bright smile goes soft when he talks about his home. He stands for a moment, obviously lost in thought, and Yugoda stands with him. She doesn’t want to interrupt whatever fond thoughts of his family he’s pondering.

Yugoda never started a family, just kept Kanna’s old polar bear dog by her side. There had been women, sometimes, but most relationships in the Northern Water Tribe ended in marriage and Yugoda had never quite moved on from her first love, the woman with knowing eyes and soaring wings. Sometimes she regrets it- even if she had never married, single women adopting children wasn’t  _ unheard  _ of, and Yugoda had always liked kids. 

She doesn’t know, though, if she would change anything about her life. Maybe her one true regret is not absconding with Kanna, not taking the leap and flying away. 

Finally, Hakoda startles and blinks at Yugoda, smile widening. “Sorry about that. I just can’t quite believe I’m really back. I’ve missed this place. Here, I’ll walk you to the school. It’s a pretty big space and your place is just off it. You can get all situated, settle in. We’re having a big family dinner-” and Yugoda wonders how big Hakoda’s family is, how broad his definition of the word- “tonight to celebrate your arrival. Mom said you’re friends- she says you’re one of the best women she’s ever known, and my mom is one of the best judges of character I’ve ever met.”

Hakoda and Yugoda walk arm in arm through the still-small tribe, passing old women and young men, children and teenagers. There’s a quietly haunted look to them that reminds Yugoda of the blankness of Hakoda’s face earlier, and she’s reminded how much she was shielded from the worst of the war by thick walls of her tribe.

“You must be so glad to be home to your tribe,” Yugoda says.

Hakoda tilts his head. “I am,” he says, and he means the words so much that Yugoda can hear it, “but it’s not about being at the South Pole, or even with the people of my tribe again. It’s about my family, about Bato and mom and the kids. When we were at sea, even with Bato in bed next to me, there was a missing space where the kids would curl up between us on cold nights.” He looks at Yugoda. “It doesn’t matter where I put down roots if the people I love aren’t there, you know?”

“I-” Yugoda thinks of years and years, searching for something to make her feel home in her home, of burying her face in Inaq’s fur out of some absurd hope that he would smell like Kanna again. “I do. I’m glad you found home again.”

Hakoda flashes a grin at her and comes to a stop in front of two linked igloos, just a little bigger and newer than most of the others. It’s impressive craftsmanship, the work of a waterbender, and there are a few tweaks to the way it’s put together that make Yugoda think that whoever designed it knew what they were doing. “This is the school,” Hakoda says, “the kids put it together for you. It’s pretty simple inside- we built snow benches for your bed and for the students to sit in, but if you need anything else, just call for Katara.”

“Thank you,” Yugoda says, and Inaq barks in agreement.

Across the open ice, a woman raises her hand in greeting. “Hakoda!” She calls, “C’mere and tell my wife about that  _ colossus  _ catch I got yesterday, the one that practically pulled my arm in-”

“Lirin,” Hakoda shouts back, “you  _ know  _ that didn’t happen-”

The woman puts both hands on her hips and shouts, “well, c’mere anyway, I’ve got some complaints for my chief.”

Hakoda gives Yugoda an apologetic look. “Sorry, I have to go, but- see you at dinner, right?” He’s already half-skipping off by the time he finishes his sentence.

“Dinner,” Yugoda agrees, patting her thigh to make sure Inaq follows her when she ducks into the igloo. The inside is warm with trapped heat, neat steps climbing down into a solidly sized room. It looks like someone had recreated her classroom from memory, with benches in rows, all draped with fur, and a basin of freezing water in the middle.

Sitting on a bench next to the water and staring into its reflection is Kanna. She looks so much older than the last time Yugoda saw her, wrinkles accumulated at the corners of her eyes and along her forehead, but her eyes are the same. 

Yugoda stands frozen in the doorway- she’d known that she would run into Kanna, of course, had looked forward to their reunion in a way she can’t articulate except to say that she needed it, but now that she sees the other woman, all she can remember is  _ promise?  _ and the hope that Kanna remembered so loud that it roars in her ears. 

“Kanna?” She says, and her voice comes out hoarse, more old-lady-like than she’s sounded in all her years of aging. 

Kanna moves slowly now, a stiffness to her joins that Yugoda thinks must be worse than her own, most be compounded by every tragedy she went through, every year she had to be stronger for her children, her grandchildren. There are five beads in her hair now: her parents, her childhood, Yugoda, and the woman Yugoda can see in Katara’s eyes, the one Kanna gave Pakku’s necklace to. 

She turns and stands, walking over to Yudoda. She’s still tall for a woman, eyes level with Yugoda even as Yugoda stands a step above her. “Pebble,” she breathes, one hand reaching up to caress Yugoda’s face. Her face breaks into a wry smile, the one that Yugoda has seen a thousand different times. “Did a wave finally come whisk you away to me?”

“I made my own,” Yugoda says. “I brought myself here.”

“I never forgot,” Kanna says. Her thumb is smooth against Yugoda’s cheek and Yugoda leans into the touch without thinking. “I could never forget you.”

Yugoda steps down next to Kanna, moving the hand on her face to between her hands, entangling their fingers. They walk together to one of the benches and sit down slowly. They don’t say anything- they don’t have to, both quietly reveling in being in the other’s company again. 

Kanna’s hand tightens around Yugoda’s and Yugoda looks over at her profile. There are tiny beads of water in the corners of her eyes, and her teeth are carefully grit in the way of someone trying not to cry. 

Yugoda gently leans on the other woman’s shoulder, wrapping her arms around her just like she would as a teenager. 

“I should have taken you with,” Kanna says, voice tight. Yugoda starts to rub circles on the back of her hand, thumb pad running over the veins that stand out so much more now. “I’ve spent forty years wishing I could have done something different, that I could have convinced you to come with me.”

“I’m here now,” Yugoda says. She doesn’t say that she wishes the same thing, that she can see the same past Kanna is describing and that she yearns for it so badly that it hurts. The past is the past, and Yugoda knows just as well as anyone else that there’s nothing worth dwelling on it for. “I’m not going to leave.”

“Promise?”

Yugoda gently lifts Kanna’s head and presses a kiss to her mouth, eyes crinkling with an unexpressed smile when Kanna kisses her back. She’s spent decades imagining how she would kiss Kanna when she saw her again- deeply, softly- but now the kiss doesn’t even seem like the important part. The important part is telling Kanna that as much as they’ve both changed,  _ this  _ hasn’t. That this  _ won’t. _

She finally pulls away, leaving a hand cupping Kanna’s jaw. Kanna smiles crookedly and Yugoda sighs happily. “Promise,” she says.

**Author's Note:**

> \- kanna/yugoda was a ship i came up with for a bakoda fic literally by looking at women kanna's age in the water tribes and then i was like :0 and became invested in them. literally their lives.. incredible. they're both so badass.  
> \- FUCK pakku WHY does he get together w kanna in the end?? she only went ACROSS THE GLOBE to get away from him >:( kanna deserved a girlfriend.  
> \- this was written for day 7 of atla wlw week for the prompt free day bc i couldn't decide if it fit anything else well enough. as always, u can find me on tumblr [@lazypigeon](https://yearning-hours.tumblr.com/)! i hope u all have wonderful days (or nights!!) :)


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